Evolutionary Algorithms: Concepts, Designs, and Applications in Bioinformatics Evolutionary Algorithms for Bioinformatics

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Evolutionary Algorithms: Concepts, Designs, and Applications in Bioinformatics Evolutionary Algorithms for Bioinformatics Evolutionary Algorithms: Concepts, Designs, and Applications in Bioinformatics Evolutionary Algorithms for Bioinformatics Ka-Chun Wong Department of Computer Science, University of Toronto, Ontario, Canada INTRODUCTION Since genetic algorithm was proposed by John Holland (Holland J. H., 1975) in the early 1970s, the study of evolutionary algorithm has emerged as a popular research field (Civicioglu & Besdok, 2013). Researchers from various scientific and engineering disciplines have been digging into this field, exploring the unique power of evolutionary algorithms (Hadka & Reed, 2013). Many applications have been successfully proposed in the past twenty years. For example, mechanical design (Lampinen & Zelinka, 1999), electromagnetic optimization (Rahmat-Samii & Michielssen, 1999), environmental protection (Bertini, Felice, Moretti, & Pizzuti, 2010), finance (Larkin & Ryan, 2010), musical orchestration (Esling, Carpentier, & Agon, 2010), pipe routing (Furuholmen, Glette, Hovin, & Torresen, 2010), and nuclear reactor core design (Sacco, Henderson, Rios-Coelho, Ali, & Pereira, 2009). In particular, its function optimization capability was highlighted (Goldberg & Richardson, 1987) because of its high adaptability to different function landscapes, to which we cannot apply traditional optimization techniques (Wong, Leung, & Wong, 2009). BACKGROUND Evolutionary algorithms draw inspiration from nature. An evolutionary algorithm starts with a randomly initialized population. The population then evolves across several generations. In each generation, fit individuals are selected to become parent individuals. They cross-over with each other to generate new individuals, which are subsequently called offspring individuals. Randomly selected offspring individuals then undergo certain mutations. After that, the algorithm selects the optimal individuals for survival to the next generation according to the survival selection scheme designed in advance. For instance, if the algorithm is overlapping (De Jong, 2006), then both parent and offspring populations will participate in the survival selection. Otherwise, only the offspring population will participate in the survival selection. The selected individuals then survive to the next generation. Such a procedure is repeated again and again until a certain termination condition is met (Wong, Leung, & Wong, 2010). Figure 1 outlines a typical evolutionary algorithm Figure 1. Major components of a typical evolutionary algorithm In this book chapter, we follow the unified approach proposed by De Jong (De Jong, 2006). The design of evolutionary algorithm can be divided into several components: representation, parent selection, crossover operators, mutation operators, survival selection, and termination condition. Details can be found in the following sections. • Representation: It involves genotype representation and genotype-phenotype mapping. (De Jong, 2006). For instance, we may represent an integer (phenotype) as a binary array (genotype): '19' as '10011' and '106' as '1101010'. If we mutate the first bit, then we will get '3' (00011) and '42' (0101010). For those examples, even we have mutated one bit in the genotype, the phenotype may vary very much. Thus we can see that there are a lot of considerations in the mapping. • Parent Selection: It aims at selecting good parent individuals for crossovers, where the goodness of a parent individual is quantified by its fitness. Thus most parent selection schemes focus on giving more opportunities to the fitter parent individuals than the other individuals and vice versa such that “good” offspring individuals are likely to be generated. • Crossover Operators: It resembles the reproduction mechanism in nature. Thus they, with mutation operators, are collectively called reproductive operators. In general, a crossover operator combines two individuals to form a new individual. It tries to split an individual into parts and then assemble those parts into a new individual. • Mutation Operators: It simulates the mutation mechanism in which some parts of a genome undergoes random changes in nature. Thus, as a typical modeling practice, a mutation operator changes parts of the genome of an individual. On the other hand, mutations can be thought as an exploration mechanism to balance the exploitation power of crossover operators. • Survival Selection: It aims at selecting a subset of good individuals from a set of individuals, where the goodness of individual is proportional to its fitness in most cases. Thus survival selection mechanism is somehow similar to parent selection mechanism. In a typical framework like 'EC4' (De Jong, 2006), most parent selection mechanisms can be re-applied in survival selection. • Termination Condition: It refers to the condition at which an evolutionary algorithm should end. EVOLUTIONARY ALGORITHMS: CONCEPTS AND DESIGNS Representation Representation involves genotype representation and genotype-phenotype mapping. In general, designers try to keep genotype representation as compact as possible while keeping it as close to the corresponding phenotype representations as possible such that measurement metrics, say distance, in the genotype space can be mapped to those in phenotype space without the loss of semantic information. Figure 2. Some representations of evolutionary algorithms: (a) Integer representation (b) Protein structure representation on a lattice model (c) Tree representation for a mathematical expression In general, there are many types of representations that an evolutionary algorithm can adopt. For example, fixed-length linear structures, variable-length linear structures, and tree structures…… Figure 2 depicts three examples. Figure 2a is a vector of integers. We can observe that its genotype is a binary array with length equal to 10. To map it into the phenotype space, the first 5 binary digits (10011) are mapped to the first element (19) of the vector whereas the remaining 5 binary digits (11110) are mapped to the second element (30) of the vector. Figure 2b is the relative encoding representation of a protein on the HP lattice model (Krasnogor, Hart, Smith, & Pelta, 1999). Its genotype is an array of moves and its length is set to the amino acid sequence length of the protein. The array of moves encodes the relative positions of amino acids from their predecessor amino acids. Thus we need to follow the move sequence to compute the 3D structure of the protein (phenotype) for further evaluations. Figure 2c is the tree representation of a mathematical expression. Obviously, such tree structure is a variable length structure, which has the flexibility in design. If the expression is short, it can be shrunk during the evolution. If the expression is long, it can also be expanded during the evolution. Thus we can observe that the structure has an advantage over the previous representations. Nevertheless, there is no free lunch. It imposes several implementation difficulties to translate it into phenotypes. Parent Selection Parent selection aims at selecting “good” parent individuals for crossover, where the goodness of a parent individual is positively proportional to its fitness for most cases. Thus most parent selection schemes focus on giving more opportunities to the fitter parent individuals than the other individuals and vice versa. The typical methods are listed as follows: • Fitness Proportional Selection: The scheme is sometimes called roulette wheel selection. In the scheme, the fitness values of all individuals are summed. Once summed, the fitness of each individual is divided by the sum. The ratio then becomes the probability for each individual to be selected. • Rank Proportional Selection: Individuals with high ranks are given more chances to be selected. Unlike fitness proportional scheme, the rank proportional scheme does not depend on the actual fitness values of the individuals. It is a double-edged sword. On the positive side, it can help us prevent the domination of very high fitness values. On the negative side, it imposes additional computational costs for ranking. • Uniform Deterministic Selection: The scheme is the simplest among the other schemes. All individuals are selected, resulting in uniform selection. • Uniform Stochastic Selection: The scheme is the probabilistic version of uniform deterministic selection. All individuals are given equal chances (equal probabilities) to be selected. • Binary Tournament: Actually, there are other tournament selection schemes proposed in the past literature. In this book chapter, the most basic one, binary tournament, is selected and described. In each binary tournament, two individuals are randomly selected and competed with each other by fitness. The winner is then selected. Such a procedure is repeated until all vacancies are filled. • Truncation: The top individuals are selected deterministically when there is a vacancy for selection. In other words, the bottom individuals are never selected. For example, if there are 100 individuals and 50 slots are available, then the top 50 fittest individuals will be selected. Crossover Operators Crossover operators resemble the reproduction mechanism in nature. Thus they, with mutation operators, are collectively called reproductive operators. In general, a crossover operator combines two individuals to form a new individual. It tries to partition an individual into parts and then assemble the parts of two individuals into a new individual. The partitioning is not a trivial task. It depends on the representation
Recommended publications
  • Metaheuristics1
    METAHEURISTICS1 Kenneth Sörensen University of Antwerp, Belgium Fred Glover University of Colorado and OptTek Systems, Inc., USA 1 Definition A metaheuristic is a high-level problem-independent algorithmic framework that provides a set of guidelines or strategies to develop heuristic optimization algorithms (Sörensen and Glover, To appear). Notable examples of metaheuristics include genetic/evolutionary algorithms, tabu search, simulated annealing, and ant colony optimization, although many more exist. A problem-specific implementation of a heuristic optimization algorithm according to the guidelines expressed in a metaheuristic framework is also referred to as a metaheuristic. The term was coined by Glover (1986) and combines the Greek prefix meta- (metá, beyond in the sense of high-level) with heuristic (from the Greek heuriskein or euriskein, to search). Metaheuristic algorithms, i.e., optimization methods designed according to the strategies laid out in a metaheuristic framework, are — as the name suggests — always heuristic in nature. This fact distinguishes them from exact methods, that do come with a proof that the optimal solution will be found in a finite (although often prohibitively large) amount of time. Metaheuristics are therefore developed specifically to find a solution that is “good enough” in a computing time that is “small enough”. As a result, they are not subject to combinatorial explosion – the phenomenon where the computing time required to find the optimal solution of NP- hard problems increases as an exponential function of the problem size. Metaheuristics have been demonstrated by the scientific community to be a viable, and often superior, alternative to more traditional (exact) methods of mixed- integer optimization such as branch and bound and dynamic programming.
    [Show full text]
  • Genetic Programming: Theory, Implementation, and the Evolution of Unconstrained Solutions
    Genetic Programming: Theory, Implementation, and the Evolution of Unconstrained Solutions Alan Robinson Division III Thesis Committee: Lee Spector Hampshire College Jaime Davila May 2001 Mark Feinstein Contents Part I: Background 1 INTRODUCTION................................................................................................7 1.1 BACKGROUND – AUTOMATIC PROGRAMMING...................................................7 1.2 THIS PROJECT..................................................................................................8 1.3 SUMMARY OF CHAPTERS .................................................................................8 2 GENETIC PROGRAMMING REVIEW..........................................................11 2.1 WHAT IS GENETIC PROGRAMMING: A BRIEF OVERVIEW ...................................11 2.2 CONTEMPORARY GENETIC PROGRAMMING: IN DEPTH .....................................13 2.3 PREREQUISITE: A LANGUAGE AMENABLE TO (SEMI) RANDOM MODIFICATION ..13 2.4 STEPS SPECIFIC TO EACH PROBLEM.................................................................14 2.4.1 Create fitness function ..........................................................................14 2.4.2 Choose run parameters.........................................................................16 2.4.3 Select function / terminals.....................................................................17 2.5 THE GENETIC PROGRAMMING ALGORITHM IN ACTION .....................................18 2.5.1 Generate random population ................................................................18
    [Show full text]
  • Covariance Matrix Adaptation for the Rapid Illumination of Behavior Space
    Covariance Matrix Adaptation for the Rapid Illumination of Behavior Space Matthew C. Fontaine Julian Togelius Viterbi School of Engineering Tandon School of Engineering University of Southern California New York University Los Angeles, CA New York City, NY [email protected] [email protected] Stefanos Nikolaidis Amy K. Hoover Viterbi School of Engineering Ying Wu College of Computing University of Southern California New Jersey Institute of Technology Los Angeles, CA Newark, NJ [email protected] [email protected] ABSTRACT We focus on the challenge of finding a diverse collection of quality solutions on complex continuous domains. While quality diver- sity (QD) algorithms like Novelty Search with Local Competition (NSLC) and MAP-Elites are designed to generate a diverse range of solutions, these algorithms require a large number of evaluations for exploration of continuous spaces. Meanwhile, variants of the Covariance Matrix Adaptation Evolution Strategy (CMA-ES) are among the best-performing derivative-free optimizers in single- objective continuous domains. This paper proposes a new QD algo- rithm called Covariance Matrix Adaptation MAP-Elites (CMA-ME). Figure 1: Comparing Hearthstone Archives. Sample archives Our new algorithm combines the self-adaptation techniques of for both MAP-Elites and CMA-ME from the Hearthstone ex- CMA-ES with archiving and mapping techniques for maintaining periment. Our new method, CMA-ME, both fills more cells diversity in QD. Results from experiments based on standard con- in behavior space and finds higher quality policies to play tinuous optimization benchmarks show that CMA-ME finds better- Hearthstone than MAP-Elites. Each grid cell is an elite (high quality solutions than MAP-Elites; similarly, results on the strategic performing policy) and the intensity value represent the game Hearthstone show that CMA-ME finds both a higher overall win rate across 200 games against difficult opponents.
    [Show full text]
  • Completely Derandomized Self-Adaptation in Evolution Strategies
    Completely Derandomized Self-Adaptation in Evolution Strategies Nikolaus Hansen [email protected] Technische Universitat¨ Berlin, Fachgebiet fur¨ Bionik, Sekr. ACK 1, Ackerstr. 71–76, 13355 Berlin, Germany Andreas Ostermeier [email protected] Technische Universitat¨ Berlin, Fachgebiet fur¨ Bionik, Sekr. ACK 1, Ackerstr. 71–76, 13355 Berlin, Germany Abstract This paper puts forward two useful methods for self-adaptation of the mutation dis- tribution – the concepts of derandomization and cumulation. Principle shortcomings of the concept of mutative strategy parameter control and two levels of derandomization are reviewed. Basic demands on the self-adaptation of arbitrary (normal) mutation dis- tributions are developed. Applying arbitrary, normal mutation distributions is equiv- alent to applying a general, linear problem encoding. The underlying objective of mutative strategy parameter control is roughly to favor previously selected mutation steps in the future. If this objective is pursued rigor- ously, a completely derandomized self-adaptation scheme results, which adapts arbi- trary normal mutation distributions. This scheme, called covariance matrix adaptation (CMA), meets the previously stated demands. It can still be considerably improved by cumulation – utilizing an evolution path rather than single search steps. Simulations on various test functions reveal local and global search properties of the evolution strategy with and without covariance matrix adaptation. Their per- formances are comparable only on perfectly scaled functions. On badly scaled, non- separable functions usually a speed up factor of several orders of magnitude is ob- served. On moderately mis-scaled functions a speed up factor of three to ten can be expected. Keywords Evolution strategy, self-adaptation, strategy parameter control, step size control, de- randomization, derandomized self-adaptation, covariance matrix adaptation, evolu- tion path, cumulation, cumulative path length control.
    [Show full text]
  • AI, Robots, and Swarms: Issues, Questions, and Recommended Studies
    AI, Robots, and Swarms Issues, Questions, and Recommended Studies Andrew Ilachinski January 2017 Approved for Public Release; Distribution Unlimited. This document contains the best opinion of CNA at the time of issue. It does not necessarily represent the opinion of the sponsor. Distribution Approved for Public Release; Distribution Unlimited. Specific authority: N00014-11-D-0323. Copies of this document can be obtained through the Defense Technical Information Center at www.dtic.mil or contact CNA Document Control and Distribution Section at 703-824-2123. Photography Credits: http://www.darpa.mil/DDM_Gallery/Small_Gremlins_Web.jpg; http://4810-presscdn-0-38.pagely.netdna-cdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/ Robotics.jpg; http://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-edia/image/upload/18kxb5jw3e01ujpg.jpg Approved by: January 2017 Dr. David A. Broyles Special Activities and Innovation Operations Evaluation Group Copyright © 2017 CNA Abstract The military is on the cusp of a major technological revolution, in which warfare is conducted by unmanned and increasingly autonomous weapon systems. However, unlike the last “sea change,” during the Cold War, when advanced technologies were developed primarily by the Department of Defense (DoD), the key technology enablers today are being developed mostly in the commercial world. This study looks at the state-of-the-art of AI, machine-learning, and robot technologies, and their potential future military implications for autonomous (and semi-autonomous) weapon systems. While no one can predict how AI will evolve or predict its impact on the development of military autonomous systems, it is possible to anticipate many of the conceptual, technical, and operational challenges that DoD will face as it increasingly turns to AI-based technologies.
    [Show full text]
  • A Hybrid LSTM-Based Genetic Programming Approach for Short-Term Prediction of Global Solar Radiation Using Weather Data
    processes Article A Hybrid LSTM-Based Genetic Programming Approach for Short-Term Prediction of Global Solar Radiation Using Weather Data Rami Al-Hajj 1,* , Ali Assi 2 , Mohamad Fouad 3 and Emad Mabrouk 1 1 College of Engineering and Technology, American University of the Middle East, Egaila 54200, Kuwait; [email protected] 2 Independent Researcher, Senior IEEE Member, Montreal, QC H1X1M4, Canada; [email protected] 3 Department of Computer Engineering, University of Mansoura, Mansoura 35516, Egypt; [email protected] * Correspondence: [email protected] or [email protected] Abstract: The integration of solar energy in smart grids and other utilities is continuously increasing due to its economic and environmental benefits. However, the uncertainty of available solar energy creates challenges regarding the stability of the generated power the supply-demand balance’s consistency. An accurate global solar radiation (GSR) prediction model can ensure overall system reliability and power generation scheduling. This article describes a nonlinear hybrid model based on Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) models and the Genetic Programming technique for short-term prediction of global solar radiation. The LSTMs are Recurrent Neural Network (RNN) models that are successfully used to predict time-series data. We use these models as base predictors of GSR using weather and solar radiation (SR) data. Genetic programming (GP) is an evolutionary heuristic computing technique that enables automatic search for complex solution formulas. We use the GP Citation: Al-Hajj, R.; Assi, A.; Fouad, in a post-processing stage to combine the LSTM models’ outputs to find the best prediction of the M.; Mabrouk, E.
    [Show full text]
  • Long Term Memory Assistance for Evolutionary Algorithms
    mathematics Article Long Term Memory Assistance for Evolutionary Algorithms Matej Crepinšekˇ 1,* , Shih-Hsi Liu 2 , Marjan Mernik 1 and Miha Ravber 1 1 Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of Maribor, 2000 Maribor, Slovenia; [email protected] (M.M.); [email protected] (M.R.) 2 Department of Computer Science, California State University Fresno, Fresno, CA 93740, USA; [email protected] * Correspondence: [email protected] Received: 7 September 2019; Accepted: 12 November 2019; Published: 18 November 2019 Abstract: Short term memory that records the current population has been an inherent component of Evolutionary Algorithms (EAs). As hardware technologies advance currently, inexpensive memory with massive capacities could become a performance boost to EAs. This paper introduces a Long Term Memory Assistance (LTMA) that records the entire search history of an evolutionary process. With LTMA, individuals already visited (i.e., duplicate solutions) do not need to be re-evaluated, and thus, resources originally designated to fitness evaluations could be reallocated to continue search space exploration or exploitation. Three sets of experiments were conducted to prove the superiority of LTMA. In the first experiment, it was shown that LTMA recorded at least 50% more duplicate individuals than a short term memory. In the second experiment, ABC and jDElscop were applied to the CEC-2015 benchmark functions. By avoiding fitness re-evaluation, LTMA improved execution time of the most time consuming problems F03 and F05 between 7% and 28% and 7% and 16%, respectively. In the third experiment, a hard real-world problem for determining soil models’ parameters, LTMA improved execution time between 26% and 69%.
    [Show full text]
  • A Covariance Matrix Self-Adaptation Evolution Strategy for Optimization Under Linear Constraints Patrick Spettel, Hans-Georg Beyer, and Michael Hellwig
    IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON EVOLUTIONARY COMPUTATION, VOL. XX, NO. X, MONTH XXXX 1 A Covariance Matrix Self-Adaptation Evolution Strategy for Optimization under Linear Constraints Patrick Spettel, Hans-Georg Beyer, and Michael Hellwig Abstract—This paper addresses the development of a co- functions cannot be expressed in terms of (exact) mathematical variance matrix self-adaptation evolution strategy (CMSA-ES) expressions. Moreover, if that information is incomplete or if for solving optimization problems with linear constraints. The that information is hidden in a black-box, EAs are a good proposed algorithm is referred to as Linear Constraint CMSA- ES (lcCMSA-ES). It uses a specially built mutation operator choice as well. Such methods are commonly referred to as together with repair by projection to satisfy the constraints. The direct search, derivative-free, or zeroth-order methods [15], lcCMSA-ES evolves itself on a linear manifold defined by the [16], [17], [18]. In fact, the unconstrained case has been constraints. The objective function is only evaluated at feasible studied well. In addition, there is a wealth of proposals in the search points (interior point method). This is a property often field of Evolutionary Computation dealing with constraints in required in application domains such as simulation optimization and finite element methods. The algorithm is tested on a variety real-parameter optimization, see e.g. [19]. This field is mainly of different test problems revealing considerable results. dominated by Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) algorithms and Differential Evolution (DE) [20], [21], [22]. For the case Index Terms—Constrained Optimization, Covariance Matrix Self-Adaptation Evolution Strategy, Black-Box Optimization of constrained discrete optimization, it has been shown that Benchmarking, Interior Point Optimization Method turning constrained optimization problems into multi-objective optimization problems can achieve better performance than I.
    [Show full text]
  • A New Biogeography-Based Optimization Approach Based on Shannon-Wiener Diversity Index to Pid Tuning in Multivariable System
    ABCM Symposium Series in Mechatronics - Vol. 5 Section III – Emerging Technologies and AI Applications Copyright © 2012 by ABCM Page 592 A NEW BIOGEOGRAPHY-BASED OPTIMIZATION APPROACH BASED ON SHANNON-WIENER DIVERSITY INDEX TO PID TUNING IN MULTIVARIABLE SYSTEM Marsil de Athayde Costa e Silva, [email protected] Undergraduate course of Mechatronics Engineering Camila da Costa Silveira, [email protected] Leandro dos Santos Coelho, [email protected] Industrial and Systems Engineering Graduate Program, PPGEPS Pontifical Catholic University of Parana, PUCPR Imaculada Conceição, 1155, Zip code 80215-901, Curitiba, Parana, Brazil Abstract. Proportional-integral-derivative (PID) control is the most popular control architecture used in industrial problems. Many techniques have been proposed to tune the gains for the PID controller. Over the last few years, as an alternative to the conventional mathematical approaches, modern metaheuristics, such as evolutionary computation and swarm intelligence paradigms, have been given much attention by many researchers due to their ability to find good solutions in PID tuning. As a modern metaheuristic method, Biogeography-based optimization (BBO) is a generalization of biogeography to evolutionary algorithm inspired on the mathematical model of organism distribution in biological systems. BBO is an evolutionary process that achieves information sharing by biogeography-based migration operators. This paper proposes a modification for the BBO using a diversity index, called Shannon-wiener index (SW-BBO), for tune the gains of the PID controller in a multivariable system. Results show that the proposed SW-BBO approach is efficient to obtain high quality solutions in PID tuning. Keywords: PID control, biogeography-based optimization, Shannon-Wiener index, multivariable systems.
    [Show full text]
  • Natural Evolution Strategies
    Natural Evolution Strategies Daan Wierstra, Tom Schaul, Jan Peters and Juergen Schmidhuber Abstract— This paper presents Natural Evolution Strategies be crucial to find the right domain-specific trade-off on issues (NES), a novel algorithm for performing real-valued ‘black such as convergence speed, expected quality of the solutions box’ function optimization: optimizing an unknown objective found and the algorithm’s sensitivity to local suboptima on function where algorithm-selected function measurements con- stitute the only information accessible to the method. Natu- the fitness landscape. ral Evolution Strategies search the fitness landscape using a A variety of algorithms has been developed within this multivariate normal distribution with a self-adapting mutation framework, including methods such as Simulated Anneal- matrix to generate correlated mutations in promising regions. ing [5], Simultaneous Perturbation Stochastic Optimiza- NES shares this property with Covariance Matrix Adaption tion [6], simple Hill Climbing, Particle Swarm Optimiza- (CMA), an Evolution Strategy (ES) which has been shown to perform well on a variety of high-precision optimization tion [7] and the class of Evolutionary Algorithms, of which tasks. The Natural Evolution Strategies algorithm, however, is Evolution Strategies (ES) [8], [9], [10] and in particular its simpler, less ad-hoc and more principled. Self-adaptation of the Covariance Matrix Adaption (CMA) instantiation [11] are of mutation matrix is derived using a Monte Carlo estimate of the great interest to us. natural gradient towards better expected fitness. By following Evolution Strategies, so named because of their inspira- the natural gradient instead of the ‘vanilla’ gradient, we can ensure efficient update steps while preventing early convergence tion from natural Darwinian evolution, generally produce due to overly greedy updates, resulting in reduced sensitivity consecutive generations of samples.
    [Show full text]
  • Automated Antenna Design with Evolutionary Algorithms
    Automated Antenna Design with Evolutionary Algorithms Gregory S. Hornby∗ and Al Globus University of California Santa Cruz, Mailtop 269-3, NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA Derek S. Linden JEM Engineering, 8683 Cherry Lane, Laurel, Maryland 20707 Jason D. Lohn NASA Ames Research Center, Mail Stop 269-1, Moffett Field, CA 94035 Whereas the current practice of designing antennas by hand is severely limited because it is both time and labor intensive and requires a significant amount of domain knowledge, evolutionary algorithms can be used to search the design space and automatically find novel antenna designs that are more effective than would otherwise be developed. Here we present automated antenna design and optimization methods based on evolutionary algorithms. We have evolved efficient antennas for a variety of aerospace applications and here we describe one proof-of-concept study and one project that produced fight antennas that flew on NASA's Space Technology 5 (ST5) mission. I. Introduction The current practice of designing and optimizing antennas by hand is limited in its ability to develop new and better antenna designs because it requires significant domain expertise and is both time and labor intensive. As an alternative, researchers have been investigating evolutionary antenna design and optimiza- tion since the early 1990s,1{3 and the field has grown in recent years as computer speed has increased and electromagnetics simulators have improved. This techniques is based on evolutionary algorithms (EAs), a family stochastic search methods, inspired by natural biological evolution, that operate on a population of potential solutions using the principle of survival of the fittest to produce better and better approximations to a solution.
    [Show full text]
  • Evolutionary Algorithms
    Evolutionary Algorithms Dr. Sascha Lange AG Maschinelles Lernen und Naturlichsprachliche¨ Systeme Albert-Ludwigs-Universit¨at Freiburg [email protected] Dr. Sascha Lange Machine Learning Lab, University of Freiburg Evolutionary Algorithms (1) Acknowlegements and Further Reading These slides are mainly based on the following three sources: I A. E. Eiben, J. E. Smith, Introduction to Evolutionary Computing, corrected reprint, Springer, 2007 — recommendable, easy to read but somewhat lengthy I B. Hammer, Softcomputing,LectureNotes,UniversityofOsnabruck,¨ 2003 — shorter, more research oriented overview I T. Mitchell, Machine Learning, McGraw Hill, 1997 — very condensed introduction with only a few selected topics Further sources include several research papers (a few important and / or interesting are explicitly cited in the slides) and own experiences with the methods described in these slides. Dr. Sascha Lange Machine Learning Lab, University of Freiburg Evolutionary Algorithms (2) ‘Evolutionary Algorithms’ (EA) constitute a collection of methods that originally have been developed to solve combinatorial optimization problems. They adapt Darwinian principles to automated problem solving. Nowadays, Evolutionary Algorithms is a subset of Evolutionary Computation that itself is a subfield of Artificial Intelligence / Computational Intelligence. Evolutionary Algorithms are those metaheuristic optimization algorithms from Evolutionary Computation that are population-based and are inspired by natural evolution.Typicalingredientsare: I A population (set) of individuals (the candidate solutions) I Aproblem-specificfitness (objective function to be optimized) I Mechanisms for selection, recombination and mutation (search strategy) There is an ongoing controversy whether or not EA can be considered a machine learning technique. They have been deemed as ‘uninformed search’ and failing in the sense of learning from experience (‘never make an error twice’).
    [Show full text]